It’s perfect for cold weather, and especially good if you are fighting off a cold or flu. There are probably as many ways of making chicken noodle soup as there are moms who make it.
Video: How to Make Chicken Noodle Soup
The Secret Is in the Stock
The key is homemade stock made from chicken parts or a whole chicken. The rich gelatin from the chicken bones, cartilage, and tendons is good for you, and one of the reasons why homemade chicken stock is so beneficial. If you don’t already have a cache of homemade chicken stock, the following is a recipe for making the entire soup from scratch, starting with a whole chicken, parted out. Already have chicken stock? This recipe includes instructions for a 30 minute shortcut version as well. This recipe makes an especially clean tasting soup with a rich, clear broth, and plenty of noodles.
Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup From Scratch
If you have a couple hours, making chicken noodle soup entirely from scratch is the way to go. All you need is a whole chicken (cut into parts), water, celery, onions, and carrots, seasonings, and egg noodles. The recipe is basically two parts:
First, Make the Stock
Some recipes will have you cook the chicken you will use as meat in your soup for the entire time you are cooking the bones for stock. This will produce dry, over-cooked pieces of chicken. To avoid dried out chicken in our soup, in our recipe we remove the breast and thigh meat from the bones that we plan on using in the finished soup. We first make the stock and later add the raw chicken meat to cook near the end of the soup-making process. You could also cook the breast and thigh chicken pieces whole, in the broth, and remove them after 15 minutes of cooking or so, cool them and shred them to be added at service. To make the stock, we first parboil the stock meat and bones, at high rolling boil, for 3 minutes, then discard the boiling water. This hard boil forces the scum to the surface all in one go. This is a classic stock making technique that helps produce a clear, clean-tasting broth. (You will still get all of the nutritional value from the chicken during the long simmering step that follows.) We then return those parboiled meat and bones to the pot, add some celery, carrots, onions, garlic, and herbs, cover with water, and simmer for 1 1/2 hours to make the stock.
Second, Make the Soup
When the stock is ready, we strain out the solids, and add fresh veggies to the stock. Any vegetables you used in making the stock will have had all of their nutritional value simmered out of them after an hour, which is why we are adding fresh vegetables. Once the soup and vegetables are simmering, we chop up the raw chicken breast and thigh meat we had removed from the bone in the first step and return it to the soup. Next we add in the dry noodles, and the soup is done when the noodles and chicken pieces are cooked!
The Quick Version: 30-Minute Chicken Soup
If you already have chicken stock (again homemade is best), you can make this chicken noodle soup in 30 minutes or less; just start at step six. Add chopped carrots and celery to the stock and bring to a simmer. Then add chopped chicken breast or thighs and bring to a simmer again. Then add dry noodles. When the noodles are done, add seasonings like parsley, salt, pepper, and thyme, and you’re done!
How to Store and Freeze Chicken Soup
Refrigerate the finished soup for up to 5 days and reheat gently over low heat. Note that the egg noodles will expand quite a bit in the soup. If you don’t like this, cook the noodles separately and add them to each bowl. The soup will also freeze well for up to 3 months. We advise waiting to add the noodles to the soup until serving.
More Ways to Make Chicken Soup
How to Make Chicken Soup in the Pressure Cooker One Pot Chicken and Rice Soup Quick Chicken Pho Rotisserie Chicken Noodle Soup Chicken Soup with Ginger and Shiitake Mushrooms
While this recipe shows the steps for entirely homemade chicken soup, you could also easily make this chicken noodle soup starting with already prepared stock and some raw chicken. Use about 2 quarts of chicken stock, and 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts and 2 chicken thighs and proceed to step 6. Making soup this way will take about 30 minutes.
One 3 1/2-pound chicken, cut into parts—breast, thighs, backs, wings, and neck (if available)
2 carrots, scrubbed clean, unpeeled, and cut into 2 inch chunks
2 celery ribs, cut into 2 inch pieces (include celery tops)
1 onion, quartered (peel on is okay)
3 cloves garlic, cut in half (peal on is ok)
2 to 3 sprigs fresh thyme (or 1 teaspoon dried)
1/2 bunch parsley
5 whole peppercorns
For the soup:
3 carrots, peeled and cut into 1/4-inch rounds
3 celery ribs cut into 1/4-inch thick slices
4 to 8 ounces egg noodles (depending on how noodle-y you want your soup)
Fresh chopped parsley, to finish
Freshly ground black pepper, to finish
Fresh thyme, to finish
Remove and discard the largest pieces of breast and thigh skin. Cut away and discard excess fat from chicken pieces.
Add the quartered onion, garlic cloves, thyme, one-half of the parsley, and the peppercorns to the pot.
Cover with an inch or two of water (about 3 quarts). Bring to a low simmer (about 185°F) and let simmer (the stock should be just barely bubbling), partially covered, for 1 1/2 hours.
If you want, set aside and strip the bones of any remaining meat. After parboiling and 1 1/2 hours of cooking the meat will be rather dry and tasteless, though you could use it in a chicken salad.
5 Salt the stock: Taste the stock. It should be rather bland because up to now, no salt has been added. Add salt to taste. As a guideline, for each quart of stock, add 2 teaspoons of salt.
Note that the noodles will expand substantially in the soup broth as they cook.
